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Isaac Shelby

1911 Encyclopedia Britannica

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ISAAC SHELBY (1750-1826), American soldier and pioneer, was born at North Mountain, near Hagerstown, Maryland, on the 11th of December 1750. With his father, Evan Shelby (1720-1794), an emigrant from Wales, he removed to what is now Bristol, Tennessee, in 1771, and in 1774 took a conspicuous part in the battle of Point Pleasant. 2 He was a surveyor in Kentucky for the Transylvania Company in 1775; became a captain of Virginia minute-men in 1776, and in 1777 became commissary with supervision over transportation of supplies from Staunton, Virginia, to the frontier. In 1779 he was elected to the Virginia House of Delegates, but, by the line established between Virginia and North Carolina at this time, he became a resident of North Carolina and he was appointed colonel of the Sullivan county militia, which in 1780 he commanded in guerilla fighting, and he led the left centre of the American force at King's Mountain (October 7). He served under General Francis Marion in 1781, and in 1782 was a member of the North Carolina House of Commons. He was active in the movement for the erection of the state of Kentucky, was a member of the Kentucky Constitutional Convention of 1792, and was governor of the new state in1792-1796and in 1812-1816; in 1813 he commanded twelve Kentucky regiments at the battle of the Thames, and for his services received the thanks of Congress and a gold medal. In 1818 he was a commissioner with Andrew Jackson to the Chickasaws. He died on his estate in Lincoln county, Kentucky, on the ,8th of July 1826.